Saudi Arabia's defending Dakar Rally champion Yazeed Al-Rajhi struggled on Sunday's first full stage on home terrain, clocking up 16 minutes of penalties as X-Raid Mini driver Guillaume de Mevius took the lead.
Al-Rajhi was penalised for missing a waypoint and speeding and ended up nearly 29 minutes off the Belgian's lead with 12 more stages of the endurance event to come over the next two weeks in Saudi Arabia.
Qatar's five-times winner Nasser Al-Attiyah was in second place for the Dacia Sandriders team, 40 seconds behind de Mevius.
"We had a good pace and could have pushed harder, but when we saw (Dacia teammate) Sebastien Loeb with two flat tyres, we decided to be cautious and avoid puncturing ourselves," said the Qatari.
Czech driver Martin Prokop was in third place for the Orlen Jipocar team after 305 km (190 miles) of competitive action around Yanbu on the Red Sea coast, with Sweden's Mattias Ekstrom fourth in a Ford Raptor.
In the motorcycle category, Spaniard Edgar Canet continued to lead KTM teammate Daniel Sanders after they finished the prologue in that order, with American Ricky Brabec third on a Honda.
Botswana's Ross Branch was fastest on two wheels in the 305 km special stage but was then given a six-minute penalty for speeding.